1 C butter, softened
1 C sugar
1 egg
1 tsp. almond extract
1 tsp. vanilla extract
2 3/4 C flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
3/4 cup whole blanched almonds
red food coloring
and/or
1 tube red decorator gel

Makes About 5 Dozen Cookies

Preheat oven to 325° F. Combine dry ingredients. Lightly grease a cookie sheet.

In a large bowl, beat together butter, sugar, egg, almond extract and vanilla, beat in dry ingredients. Cover and refrigerate dough for 30 minutes.

Working with one-quarter of the dough at a time and keeping remaining dough refrigerated, roll heaping teaspoons full of dough into finger shape for each cookie. Press an almond firmly into one end for nail. Squeeze in center to create a knuckle shape and use a paring knife make slashes in several places to form knuckle. If you want to paint the nails, use some red food coloring that's been diluted with water and brush on with a clean artist's brush.

Place cookies on the prepared cookie sheet and bake for 20-25 minutes or until pale golden. Let cool for three minutes. If desired, lift up almond and squeeze red decorator gel onto nail bed and press almond back in place so gel oozes out from underneath.

Remove from cookie sheet and let cool on a wire rack. Repeat with remaining dough.

Note: Make cookies smaller than you think they need to be, as they spread when cooking. Our witch has fat fingers because we didn't heed our own advice.